N.Y. legislator admits to campaigning during COVID crisis as Uber driver with official tags

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Title : N.Y. legislator admits to campaigning during COVID crisis as Uber driver with official tags
Link : N.Y. legislator admits to campaigning during COVID crisis as Uber driver with official tags

In a recent interview with Hudson Power Broker, a conservative aggregate news site run by Assemblyman Kieran Lalor (R-Dutchess County), Brescia said he’s been driving for the ride-hailing service for the past four months and chatting with riders about his campaign.

ALBANY — An Orange County legislator running for state Senate has been moonlighting as an Uber driver — in a car with official county plates on it.

Republican L. Stephen Brescia, the chairman of the Orange County Legislature, is hoping to unseat first-term Sen. James Skoufis (D-Orange County) in the general election in November.

“You know without being able to fund-raise, it’s been very difficult, but I’ve been out Uber driving a little bit and I’ve enjoyed it,” Brescia told Lalor when asked about how he’s been campaigning given the coronavirus pandemic.

“It gets me around the district, I meet a lot of people and [spread] the word,” he added.

Brescia uses his personal vehicle, an Acura TL, per his Uber profile, when picking up fares. The car has plates identifying him as a county official, which a spokesman said Brescia pays for.

“Under state law, county legislators are able to have plates they pay for on their personal vehicles which identify themselves as county legislators,” Orange County spokesman Justin Rodriguez told the Daily News. “Mr. Brescia doesn’t have a county-owned-or-issued car. He uses his private vehicle.”

Rodriguez did not say whether driving the car for-hire with the plates presented any ethical issues.

Brescia’s Uber profile, in which he uses the first name Louis, features a patriotic picture of the local elected standing in front of an American flag. The same photo appears on his official Orange County page.

Stephen Brescia's Uber profile.

The longtime public servant noted that he’s been a member of the County Legislature for more than 26 years and has had the plates for “many of those years.”

“Ninety-five percent of my customers don’t even notice my plates, but, if it is a requirement that I can’t have them as an Uber driver, then I will turn them in,” he told the Daily News.

Unlike in the city, Uber drivers upstate do not need commercial insurance or special livery plates. A spokesman for the company did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Specialty plates aren’t the only perk of Brescia’s decades in local government.

In addition to pulling in nearly $50,000 in taxpayer money as a legislator and voting for a raise for himself this year, Brescia also makes just over $17,000 a year as mayor of Montgomery, a small village about 12 miles west of Newburgh. Brescia has held that post since 1990.

In his interview with Lalor, Brescia, who was busted for DWI in 1998, slammed Skoufis as soft on crime and too generous with taxpayer dollars.

“He’s just a tax-and-spend liberal Democrat and there’s no way around it,” he said.

Skoufis declined to comment on his opponent’s side gig.